Aurelio Cassano

Postwar EuropeanItalian Neorealism through the French New Wave

"I read film history backwards. I started with the directors who refused glamour — De Sica, Rossellini, Antonioni — and worked outward from there. What I look for in a film is what the filmmaker would not let themselves do. Sentimentality, false resolution, an easy shot. The films I send my members are films of refusal."

"My favourite room to watch a film in is small, lit from one corner, and quiet enough that you can hear the projector if there were one. I send mostly black-and-white. I am unfair about runtime."

— Aurelio

From recent slates

I wanted you to see this one for the way the camera doesn't move. There is a single shot near the end that lasts almost six minutes. Watch what the actor does in the second minute. She knows.

— On a film sent in March, title withheld

A film about a marriage and a window. Not a marriage seen through a window — a marriage in which a window is the third character. Pay attention to who closes it.

— On a film sent in July, title withheld

This is a film I have shown to nearly every member who has been with me longer than a year. I have stopped explaining why. It will explain itself.

— On a film sent in November, title withheld

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